Cockroach Café 🪳 🪳 🪳New Year 2025

[MereDintofPandiculation]

Welcome in to the Cockroach Café Bad Daughters’ Room, the rugs and cushions all fresh and clean for the new season.
Good daughters, find your way to the small room behind the stairs. Sorry it’s not as equipped as here, but it doesn’t get much use.
Come in when you want to share good news, or to rant, or just to hang out with others who understand what you're going through. The way MN works, hopefully this thread won’t appear in any featured lists, and the only people wandering in will be those who understand what it’s all about.
If you have a BIG question, it might be worth giving it its own thread, so as not to swamp this one.
For newbies: why cockroach? Previous long term resident of "Elderly Parents" Yolo's DM attended a 'small animal event' in a nursing home, and was presented with a "small animal with a hard back" the name of which species she couldn't remember. Her ever helpful DB suggested cockroach, and it has become a toast on here. My recent enquiries suggested more people wanted to keep the well known name than wanted to change it to something more savoury, so for the moment it stays.

@countrygirl99 has it - let them report that MIL needs 24/7 care @SockFluffInTheBath - although I know your MIL was happy it seems she is now unsettled and it’s all too much. Is FIL still fighting infection or is the threat he’ll be sent home just put off until Monday?

In any other part of my life this is exactly how I would come back. DH is scared we’ll lose the crumbs of control we have, and that MIL would be ‘taken away’. She’s happy here with her cat and feeding the birds, and he’s scared a move might be the end of her. It’s so nice without FIL here though, silver lining.

Thanks both 💐

@FiniteSagacity sorry, missed your post. No date for FIL coming out, they still can’t place either kind of catheter, and he’s still on IV antibiotics. Doesn’t seem to be much doing to be honest, it’s like they’re happy for him to just stay there as he is.

Watch, now I’ve said that he’ll appear on the doorstep 🙄

That is not how it works @SockFluffInTheBath, you do not live with MIL and are not responsible. I left DAunt in a situation with no carers to return to my family and work hundreds of miles away. Social services knew the situation as did the GP and it was not deemed neglect.

If she needs 24/7 care and social services are assessing this week then any crisis that happens between now and them arriving then carers need to phone an ambulance for her to be admitted, the only other way around this is for GP to come out on a home visit and the urgent community response team/local district nursing/care team cover with extra calls to avoid hospital admission. I did manage to get this stop-gap cover for DAunt at one point until the useless GP and social care said she had capacity and it stopped again which ended up with her being admitted to hospital due to falling.

@sockfluffinthebath I hear you, but what (or who) will crash if you carry on as you are?

Thanks @Choconuttolata I think the problem, not a problem but is a problem, is that DH doesn’t want the crisis to happen for MIL. We’ve been asking for respite care or extra calls or something but all we got was the reassessment offer.

@countrygirl99 ha, us. Hoping we get 24hr care from the assessment. If we don’t then we’ll need to think again, we can’t actually keep this up.

Poking my head round the door to ask if I might join you?

mum, 93, clearly has some form of dementia but won’t accept an appointment to the memory clinic and gets annoyed if we suggest carer help. She lives alone.

im on if three siblings, we each visit twice a week but never together as this gives mum more visits (and limits our need to interact as there is some friction).

mum no longer cooks for herself or reliably warms up leftovers but will make herself a cheese sandwich.

she doesn’t wash unless I cajole her into the shower. She wears the same clothes for weeks on end.

as much as one sibling and I want to encourage mum to have more support, the other sibling works against us.

there is no POA in place as mum would only sign a document that meant the three of us could act on a majority vote, and that’s the one way you can’t write POA.

we are just waiting for the next crisis, wondering if it’s going to be mum’s situation or yet another row between siblings.

@FriendlyGreenAlien welcome - you will get a lot of support and love here.

@FriendlyGreenAlien hello. I would do almost anything to avoid a row between us three siblings (which unfortunately leaves me frequently stuck between the other two) as we can hurt each other more than anyone else can. Sheesh. Big hand to you all for providing such great care.

I gave up a long time ago on 'nutrition' per se for DM at 90 but there's no doubt that when someone is still at home it makes a difference. I suppose at least the cheese is protein.

Hi there, I'd like to come along to the cafe too if I may? Was directed here from another recent post that I had a bit of a rant on.

Am caring for a mother with Parkinsons and a cognitive impairment. Have a decent relationship with her but she refuses any support, takes any suggestion of it as offensive and says we are trying to ship her off to a home. Still lives independently in a flat, but is getting less able to care for herself. Not eating properly which then leads to more falls. She's become very incontinent. Stubborn as a mule. And like many others on here, I am also dealing with working full time and have teenage kids.

Not necessarily looking for answers, as I think I just need to take baby steps to getting her support, but just wanted to join a safe space where I can moan when it gets too much.

May I join? My beloved mum died a few weeks ago, and I’m struggling with everything, and looking after DDad, as he’s 93, and living on his own. I’m trying to do everything, and teach him how to do things to remain independent, and he’s doing well, but I’m utterly overwhelmed. No help or support, and dad has several issues which make things harder, mobility, sight problems, and likely mild cognitive impairment. I’m lost in all the things that need doing. I’ve lost myself.

I’ve found this thread a really welcoming and helpful place to let off steam (and get great advice). Welcome new people.

Gosh, woman newcomers. Welcome there's always room.

Took mum to visit a care home this morning, not one I would have chosen for her as I've seen better (but also much worse) but she lives in a small town she doesn't want to leave so choice is limited to take it or leave it. Fortunately she seemed to like it so need to arrange for her to spend a day there.

Welcome all new people, this is a safe place to vent and it is ok to be honest about not coping here. No judgement, we are all in the trenches.

I myself have been wobbling for the last few days feeling overwhelmed by everything, but today I am going to do the small admin things that are in my control to get some of the mental burden off my plate.

Be kind to yourselves everyone, you are doing the best you can in very difficult circumstances xx

Welcome ladies 🍷

@countrygirl99 that sounds promising, fingers crossed!

@Choconuttolata hope you get some time to put your feet up, mentally too.

Had the SW assessment this morning, MIL was not in a good mood, don’t know if that helped. SW was a former Alzheimer’s nurse. Kept asking for the financials, seemed fixated, so hoping that means she agrees to 24hr care and just needs to dot the i’s.

FIL was apparently due to be discharged today because he can walk (lies, and unsurprisingly no discharge meeting) and they finally managed to fit a suprapubic catheter under local, but then he vomited coffee grounds this morning. Not unduly concerned as he eats nurofen like sweets (instructions are not for real men who know best). If it keeps him in a while longer then hoorah.

@BestIsWest and @SockFluffInTheBath have fingers crossed for you both 🤞🤞

Welcome new daughters, plenty of space on the bad daughter’s bench. Do help yourself to any refreshments you realise you badly need because you’ve been ignoring your own thirst/hunger all day 🍷 ☕️

Trying to enjoy a break from visits and finding I’m struggling to relax here. I know I’m lucky, I popped in to remind myself!

I need to learn to keep my stupid thoughts to myself. Hospital want DH and BIL in together tomorrow. FIL is now bleeding from both ends, and refusing tests. Could be something bad or something not bad, but no way of knowing.

SW has said she is taking MIL’s case to review for funding, talked about respite care instead of care at home. DH is distraught that she will be taken from her home and cat, which would make her very unhappy. Not sure if we can invoke PoA and offer a charge on the house to keep her home with 24hr care? Her carers today have been a slapdash joke, not what he needs, he’s really struggling at the moment.

@FiniteSagacity enjoy the well earned peace 🍷

Welcome all, we all have varying levels of coping and crisis, there is plenty of listening and advice and gin and sympathy .

Solidarité as we say!

Hello, popping in for a gin and a breather.
Another day of dealing with stupid in-laws.
love to everyone dealing with this stuff.

Hello, can I join? Mum 88 and dad 93, living independently in a nice managed flat, both children 30 minutes drive away and everyone pulling together to help. Multiple health and mobility problems on both sides.

Finally got to the point where they are prepared to get home help in. We have organised a visit from social care assessment, and we are waiting for that appointment, but DM is also keen to investigate private care, independently hired. Previous experience with at-home care (the Re-ablement team, assigned after one of dad's many falls landed him in the frailty unit for a couple of days) has not been very successful: too many different people, some of whom were 'loud' and 'clumsy', times too erratic - was dad going to be washed and dressed at 7am or 10am?. That experience has left them sceptical about LA/NHS provision.

The hope is that a private carer, independently hired, will be able to turn up at specific times, get to know them, fit in better. They have been given a recommendation by the house manager, a carer who already works for one of the other residents. We're meeting her on Thursday.

My question is: what kind of questions should I ask and what kind of contract are we looking at? I don't want my parents on the hook as 'employers', with a requirement for NI, sick pay, holiday pay, etc.

Does anyone have any experience of this?

Your best bet is to use agencies so they can cover holidays/sick etc rather than employ directly. Standard varies hugely and most will cover LA funded as well as self funded. MILs LA funded carers were wonderful, mum's self funded are slap dash and I can't understand why my brother (who has sole POA) won't change given how much he complains about them. Ask around for local recommendations.

Thanks countrygirl. I'm hoping that we will go the agency route, even if self-funded, for those very reasons. I don't think DM has given a thought to holidays/sick cover/insurance, and that's where I come in. The recommendation for the carer we're meeting on Thursday did come word of mouth, so hopefully she is good - but it's all the admin around it, and cover for days she's off, that also has to be dealt with.

I hope you have better luck than I am with care homes. Mum is determined not to leave her small town which gives a choiceof precisely 1 care home, take it or leave it. Visited yesterday and can't say I was particularly impressed but I have seen much worse. Last week when I spoke to the manager she said if mum liked it she could come for a day to get a better feel for it. Trying to arrange it but manager is on leave and the regional manager is saying lunch only and someone must stay with her. So I'm already pissed off already and we haven't even applied for a place! I've suggested visiting others before she makes up her mind but she won't budge on location. She thinks her friends will visit but she's 87 and most of them are too poorly to visit even locally and she hasn't seen most of them since before covid. This home is bottom end of the price range and she was horrified at that so I'm probably on a loser trying to get her to look elsewhere.

I think you just have to go with that @countrygirl99 and then if her needs or cognitive state changes then you can think again.

Hopefully she will enjoy going for lunch and say yes.